﻿﻿Synopsis﻿﻿

Annabelle is an outgoing assistant to a leader in the media industry. What she thinks will be an amazing career starter will push her patience and sanity to the limits. That is until she meets Lucian, a hunk of a man with determination and loyalty the likes of which she's never seen. When their chance meeting blooms into a wild romance Annabelle's life is changed forever by the whirl-wind that is Lucian and it threatens to break all of her well constructed walls. But Annabelle has a dark past she's afraid to share with Lucian and the past has a habit of trying to resurface in the future. When it does she must make the decision to share her past with Lucian and let him in or neither of them may survive.

Character Bios

Annabelle West

Hey, I’m Annabelle. When I was eight my parents were killed in a car crash and I moved in with my best friend Miranda and her mom, Isabelle. Isabelle adopted me and raised me as her own and Miranda made it her mission in life to protect her new sister from whatever monsters were in the world.

Fast forward to five years ago when I was in college and living with my boyfriend Mark. On the surface everything was fine and to any outsider we were the perfect couple. Mark was polite, caring and prided on keeping me safe, but behind closed doors he made me feel worthless, stifled my freedom and often verbally abused me. Looking back on it now I know I should have left him, but it’s easy to see the past’s mistakes. When Mark started hitting me I did everything I could to cover it up, I drifted from my friends, ignored my school work and lied to myself. But one night he beat me so close to death he had to stop. Then he threatened Miranda. I realized that I could no longer hide what he’d done, but I had to stand up and protect my family. So I did. I called the cops, I recovered and I tried to move on with my life.

Its been five years since I graduated college and began to work for Eyvett Myerson, one of the biggest names in the media industry. I've managed to pick my life backup and restore as much self-confidence as I can manage. The only thing left… is love, but damn it that’s hard to find once you've been burned. Not a single man I've dated, if you can call it that, since Mark has either been too frightened of Mark finding us or treated me like a glass doll. I’m sick of it and I’m better off focusing on what I can actually achieve in life, my career.

Lucian Brandt

Hello, I’m Lucian Brandt co-owner of L&D Brandt. I’m six foot two and I have green eyes and dark hair. I go to the gym regularly, I know how to cook and I make enough money to keep any woman happy and satisfied for life. I enjoy long walks and hope to have a bundle of kids one day.

At least that’s what the dating ad my brother wants me to put in the paper would say. In reality I enjoy a good runner’s high, I learned to cook because otherwise I would have starved in college and I have so much money that I rarely tell women about it. The real me went to college out of state and received a bachelor in business and later returned to Washington to pursue a masters degree. I have a very short history with women mostly because my mother raised me to be a gentleman, but she also raised me to have morals and often it’s difficult to find a woman to whom I can show both.

If you asked my brother, I have a stick up my ass and I rarely know how to have a good time. Personally, I don’t understand the appeal of sleeping with a different woman every night but, hey it’s his life. My brother and I have worked very hard over the years to amass the wealth and power we have over this city and in doing so I have become an overly active work-a-holic with an aversion to time wasters, mostly women. My buddy from high school, Tin, would say it’s because I’ve been burned so many times before. He’s wrong though, in order to be burned you have touch a flame, a woman so bright she sears her way onto your heart and binds herself to you. I’ve never found one and I don’t think I ever will.